Light emitting diodes (LEDs) have several major benefits compared to other lighting source. For example, LEDs typically have longer life spans than other comparable light emitting elements, such as incandescent lights or fluorescent lights. Moreover, LEDs are typically more energy efficient, compared to conventional light emitting sources. Thus, LEDs are incorporated into many applications where it is costly to operate and/or difficult to replace the light elements. Moreover, relative to size, an LED can produce a greater amount of light, measured in lumens, than a comparatively sized non-LED light. For this reason, LEDs have been incorporated into many applications requiring small-sized light elements.
As an LED provides more light, the obvious corollary of greater light with respect to power consumption is that an LED wastes less power in the form of heat. Nonetheless, a large portion of generated heat is lost not on the light-emitting side of the diode, but instead at its circuitry base. The diode, which is an electrical circuit component, is typically mounted on a printed wiring or printed circuit board, referred to as a PCB. The heat generated by the diode is initially transferred to the PCB, and the PCB often includes a heat dissipation structure. For example, an 8-watt LED that includes proper heat dissipation may have a ten-year life span of daily 8-hour usage, while the same LED without proper heat dissipation may fail in approximately twenty minutes.
With the substantial benefits afforded LEDs, efforts have been made to incorporate LEDs into pole or stanchion-type lights, such as outdoor lamps, street lights or lantern. In line with traditional approaches to construction, LED-based outdoor lights include an internal assembly that is mounted inside of an outer shell in order to protect the internal assembly from the elements of the weather. This internal assembly typically includes a main body formed of cast aluminum for the heat dissipation structure. However, when the internal assembly is mounted within its outer shell, the internal assembly is housed within a cavity of air within the shell, and the air acts as an insulator, thus impeding heat dissipation. Moreover, within a substantially weather-sealed LED, the weather-sealed structure retains heat and it is difficult to transfer heat from inside the weather-sealed structure of the LED lighting system to outside of such structure. The result is that this type of weather-sealed LED lighting system has poor heat dissipation.
As a result, there is a need for an improved light assembly and, in particular, improved heat dissipation for use within substantially weather-sealed LED-based lighting systems.